


Your 20s Are The Best/Worst Time of Your Life

by OkaySky



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist (Anime 2003), Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Drag Shows, Fluff, M/M, Meet-Ugly, Trans Character, Trans Edward Elric, Trans Male Character, visually impaired roy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-07
Updated: 2020-10-30
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:47:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26883874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OkaySky/pseuds/OkaySky
Summary: Edward Elric is 20 years old. He's a junior in college, trying to enjoy life and get to know who he is as an adult. He's trans, he's an orphaned amputee, and he's working a boring job at a used video game store while trying to earn his degree. He's a little tired.Roy Mustang is 26 years old. He's a freshman in college, trying to re-learn how to enjoy life and get to know who he is as a human being instead of as a soldier. He's sacrificed the last 8 years of his life to the military and recovering from subsequent PTSD, the death of his best friend, and a traumatic head injury. He's a little tired.Maybe it's fate, maybe it's just the way the universe works, but it seems they've met each other at just the right time.
Relationships: Edward Elric/Roy Mustang
Comments: 53
Kudos: 92





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> *taps the microphone* hello and welcome to my incredibly self-indulgent trans!ed modern au royed fic, i hope it's as fun to read as it is to write
> 
> i'm warning y'all right now that i don't have an update schedule planned for this, it'll get posted as it gets finished which hopefully will be regularly! thanks to @KuroosSexyEyes and @inconsequentialvrb for giving this a little look-over for me

Ed glanced at the clock on the wall for perhaps the twentieth time in the past hour; about four minutes had passed since he had last checked. Twelve minutes remained in his shift, and it seemed they were determined to drag themselves out as long as possible.

“Hey Ed,” Ling called from where he was sprawled artlessly in the manager’s chair behind his computer.

“What,” Ed responded as he shuffled a stack of game cases from the buy-in table to the resurfacing station, where they could await a nice polishing of their discs.

“Could you reprint the report from register two before you leave?” Ling said as his fingers tapped away on his keyboard. “I need to add the total from that buy-in you just finished to the end of day totals.”

“This is what you get for totalling up the registers before we’re closed for the night,” Ed snapped as he made his way over to the second register to begin printing out the long list of totals of sales and purchases made throughout the day. “Some jackass always shows up right before closing with a pile of useless PS2 games to trade in whenever we close together.”

“But if I waited until after we closed, we’d be stuck here at least an extra ten minutes each night,” Ling retorted. “At least this way I only have to redo the buy-in totals from one register, but the rest of the totals are all still accurate.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Ed grumbled as he snatched the warm sheet of numbers off the printer and jabbed it in Ling’s direction. The man plucked the report from Ed’s fingers without looking and then flapped the page dramatically in front of himself before looking over the totals.

“Well, would you look at that,” Ling said. “I thought you said it was useless stuff that guy brought in? No way a pile of useless junk gets a buy-in total of over $100.”

“He had a couple of rarer games mixed in,” Ed said with a shrug as he returned to where he was busy cleaning, stickering, and sorting their newly acquired inventory. “I call first dibs on borrowing this stuff, so keep your hands to yourself.”

“I wouldn’t dream of depriving dear sweet Alphonse the joy of experiencing... Legend of Mana for himself,” Ling replied as he further inspected the report for details. 

“We’ve already played that one,” Ed said, settling the case for Legend of Mana in the rare games case where it could be proudly displayed. “Guy had a copy of the first Dot Hack game too, and Al has been itching to try it out.”

“Just make sure you fill out the rental sheet and bring it back in one piece,” Ling reminded him, as if Ed needed reminding to take good care of the store’s merchandise. If he broke something that he borrowed, the cost of paying to replace it could mean he ate nothing but ramen noodles for days. He wordlessly complied.

“Well, I suppose we can head home,” Ling said, standing from his chair and stretching his arms above his head. “You can leave the rest of that for the morning crew, if it’s all stickered.”

“Whatever I didn’t get to, I left the printed stickers on the table,” Ed said with a soft sigh. One of the perks of working with Ling was that he was a slacker, so Ed could generally count on having an easier shift and not going home with crippling pain in his ribs from over-exerting himself while binding. His chest still hurt like hell, but it was manageable. 

“Sounds good enough for me,” Ling replied cheerfully as he shouldered on his jacket and signed out of his computer. “Don’t forget to clock out.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Ed muttered as he pulled on his own red hoodie and checked the pockets to ensure his wallet and keys hadn’t fallen out. He followed Ling to register one to clock out, and then trailed after him to the front door to help him hold the metal gate shut so Ling could lock it. The taller man reached through the gate to flick off the lights, and then they were out in the warm evening air.

“Tell Alphonse I said hello,” Ling called after Ed as the blond stalked over to his car. 

“Uh-huh,” came Ed’s reply as he unlocked the car and wrenched open the door to climb inside. He cranked the radio up to block out the thoughts bouncing around in his tired brain, backed out of his parking spot, and headed home.

At the end of a shift, Ed was overwhelmingly grateful that he worked just a five minute drive from his parking garage at the edge of the university campus, and for the handicap placard that entitled him to the parking space right in front of his dorm building. He hobbled up the walkway to the side door of the worn brick building and fumbled with his lanyard to scan his student ID and badge the door open. It swung open haltingly and admitted him entrance. He maneuvered his way through the maze-like hallway towards a small lounge area not far from room 103, which he shared with Winry.

“‘m home,” Ed called into the dark room. Faint flickering light coming from around the corner warned him that the room was occupied, and he peeked around the corner. Al and Winry were stretched out on the horrendously ugly sofa wedged between the wall and an overstuffed shelf functioning as an end table, some movie Ed wasn’t familiar with playing on the television.

“Welcome home, Brother,” Al greeted him without taking his eyes off the tv screen. Ed quirked a small grin at the patent-pending Elric Brothers Concentration, which could only be broken by bodily harm or explosions or something equally dire.

“Hey, Ed,” Winry greeted with more enthusiasm, turning to offer him a smile which quickly soured as she glanced over Ed’s hunched form. “Everything okay?” she questioned him.

“I gotta get out of these clothes,” Ed said evasively. Winry narrowed her eyes.

“How long have you been wearing that binder, Ed?” she asked, voice dangerously low.

“I didn’t get a chance to take it off before I had to go to work,” he hedged as he began shuffling sideways down the hall towards room 103. “I had class until, like, right up until my shift started.”

“Edward Elric, you _know_ you aren’t supposed to go more than eight hours without taking it off!” Winry snapped, rising from the couch to follow Ed down the hall as he finally turned away from her to escape. “You could cause permanent damage to your ribs and lungs if you don’t give them a break!”

“It’s fine, Win,” Ed soothed as he yanked his work shirt over his head and tossed it on his bed. “I know my own body; I can feel when it’s reaching its limits.” He hesitated to send his binder to follow the black polo shirt, glancing over his shoulder to eye Winry in the doorframe. She rolled her eyes at his pause.

“Ed, I’ve seen you topless plenty of times before,” she sighed. “Just take the darn thing off before you hurt yourself, and let me look at your ribs.”

“You’re not a fuckin’ doctor yet,” Ed snapped, turning his face away to hide the blush in his cheeks. Even if it was Al or Winry, he still felt uncomfortably vulnerable to be seen without his binder on. “You don’t even know what you’re looking for.”

“Edward,” Winry began warningly.

“Alright, fuckin’ _fine_ , Jesus,” Ed muttered under his breath as he grabbed the bottom of the binder where it sat snugly at the bottom of his ribs and contorted his arms to pull the constricting garment over his head. He was tossing it onto the bed to lay atop his polo when he felt Winry’s fingers on his ribs, her touch gentle but sure. He flinched at the touch but allowed her to feel carefully along his ribs for anything out of the ordinary. He hissed in a sharp breath of air when she squeezed her palm against the side of his ribs and the pressure brought the dull ache in his ribs flaring to life.

“ _Ed_ !” Winry chastised when he jerked his body away from her hand. “If it’s hurting this much just from me touching it, then you’ve already started doing permanent damage to your ribs. You _need_ to take a break from wearing your binder; wear a tight sports bra or a baggy hoodie or something instead sometimes. You’re going to break yourself.”

“I’m having top surgery in, like, 3 months!” Ed complained. “I highly doubt that I’m gonna do ‘irreparable harm’ to my body by wearing a binder every day for 3 more fuckin’ months. What’s 3 months on top of the five years I’ve been wearing it already?”

“Your body has changed a lot in those five years,” Winry said in the stressed, frustrated voice that implied she currently felt like Ed was a small child refusing to eat his vegetables. “You’ve gotten broader in the shoulders and ribs, and you’ve put on a lot of muscle. That takes up more space, but you’re still wearing the same size binder. What was just tight before is completely restrictive now. And besides,” she added with a fierce grin, “it’s not like you really have that much to bind anyways,” she said with a sharp poke to Ed’s nipple. He yelped and danced away from her, diving for his dresser to pull out a thick sweatshirt and crawl inside of it where he was safe from Winry’s dangerous hands.

“Don’t just touch ‘em like that,” Ed growled from where the top half of his face was emerging from the sweatshirt.

“If you didn’t make me worry about your body, I wouldn’t feel the need to,” Winry retorted. “See, look,” she said, gesturing to Ed’s torso as he finished squirming into the shirt. “You look completely flat-chested in that. You could let your ribs rest if you just wore that out.”

“Uh, Winry, it’s a fuckin’ _sweat_ shirt,” Ed groused. “And it’s September. I’m not trying to get baked alive whenever I go outside.”

“Start wearing it in October then,” she replied sweetly. “I’m sure you’ll manage until then.”

“Ugh,” Ed growled back, turning away from Winry to divest himself of his black skinny jeans and boots in favor of his soft, worn sleep pants. “Are you going out tonight?” he asked, eager to change the subject before Winry decided to get on his case about something else.

“Nah, Sheska’s making waffles tomorrow and I want to be home for that,” she replied. Their floor’s RA was not normally the best cook, but she could make box-mix waffles in Winry’s old beat-to-hell waffle iron just fine. Ed’s mouth watered at the thought.

“Al doesn’t have classes on Monday mornings until eleven,” Ed muttered to himself. “Maybe he would want to come down to our floor and have some waffles..”

“I’m going to go back to the movie,” Winry said suddenly, the mere mention of Alphonse reminding her that she had left him alone in the lounge. “Feel free to join us.”

“Nah, I have no idea what you guys are watching and it’s already started,” Ed said as he sank down onto the edge of his bed. “I’m kind of beat anyways.”

“Suit yourself,” Winry said over her shoulder as she vacated the room. Ed sighed and let his torso fall backwards onto the bed, legs dangling over the side. The heavy weight of his legs dragging his pelvis down reminded him to do his pre-bed routine before he allowed himself to drift off, and he heaved himself back upright with a groan. 

In the small quarter-bathroom that Ed shared with Winry, he brushed his teeth, washed his face, and took his hair down from his ponytail to comb it out. Then he sat down on the edge of his bed, pulled the left leg of his pants up to his thigh, and pressed down on the button on the inside of his leg that released his prosthesis from where it was suctioned to his residual leg. After a few seconds he tugged the prosthetic off and leaned it against the wall. He unrolled the liner from his thigh and tossed it into the laundry hamper, then gently cleaned his stump and the inside of his prosthetic. Once he was done, he pushed himself back up to his foot and hopped out into the hall to wish Winry and Al goodnight. They responded distractedly; the movie seemed to be reaching a climax, as the woman on the screen was screaming and covered in blood. Ed snickered and turned to make his way back to his room. 

Ed flopped over onto the bed, letting out a deep breath of air and feeling his lungs and ribs expand further than they had all day. He pushed his binder and work polo onto the floor with one hand as he wriggled under the covers. It was only once he had settled himself comfortably that he realized he had forgotten to turn off the light.

“Fuck,” he cursed. “Hey, Winry…”

***

Ed was sitting on an uncomfortable bench across from the classroom for his English 170 - Beginning Creative Writing course about 20 minutes prior to the start of the class time, as he usually did to ensure he got his preferred seat. It was unfortunately difficult to maneuver around other students if they were already seated in his way, given the small space between their chair back and the elevated bank of tables directly behind them, and Ed liked to sit against a wall. That left him with only two options in the room without trying to climb the stairs to a higher row, and he had to get to one of those spots before someone was sitting in the way, or else he’d have to ask them to move and that was a whole ordeal… Best to just show up early and grab his spot before anyone else had a chance to get in his way and save himself the trouble.

When the doors of the classroom opened and students from the previous lecture began to pour out, Ed levered himself up to his feet and waited for the stream of bodies to thin enough that he could make his way inside. He strode to the end of the row of tables and side-stepped the empty chairs until he could fall gracelessly into his chair. In this lecture room, which seated about 50 students at maximum capacity, there were two large projector screens at the front of the room, and from his seat in the front row off to one side he had a pretty decent view of one of the two screens. It also meant that there were no opportunities for abnormally tall people to sit between Ed and the projector screen, so he never had to crane his neck around to see the whole slide. Yes, sitting in the front row had plenty of perks beyond just saving Ed the trouble of climbing steps with his prosthetic. Not that he couldn’t, but it made it a bit more obvious that he was even wearing a prosthetic, and he preferred to avoid the stares and the questions and the rest of the drama that came from cluing his fellow students in to his disability.

Lost in his musings, Ed was suddenly startled when his usual seat-neighbor dropped heavily into his own chair two seats over from Ed, with one chair left empty between them for politeness or something. They had never talked, but they had come to an unspoken agreement in the three weeks of classes they had shared that they were seat buddies. The man tilted his face slightly in Ed’s direction, just shy of making eye contact, and gave a short nod in greeting that Ed returned, then turned back to facing forward. Ed watched him with vague interest, the way a particularly lazy cat would watch a toy from across the room while making no move to get up to play. The man had long, silky black bangs that were dangling in front of his eyes, and wore a pair of browline glasses with incredibly narrow black rims. His profile, which Ed was most familiar with, featured a long, straight nose and a sharp jawline, all set in smooth porcelain skin, with his eyes hidden behind his lenses and the shadow of his fringe. He wore a dark navy blue bomber jacket habitually, much in the same way that Ed wore his red zip-up hoodie every day no matter the weather, over a white shirt. Under the table, he seemed to be wearing dark jeans and black combat boots. It seemed almost like a uniform, as so far Ed had seen him wear almost the exact same outfit in every class so far — not that he had been looking hard enough every lecture in order to catalogue such details, of course.

The man was busying himself with setting up his workspace in front of him, with a binder opened closest to him that he was leafing through, and an open pencil case neatly parallel to the table’s edge above. Compared to the simple notebook and pencil Ed had haphazardly tossed on the table, the man’s setup was much more organized and prepared, and also a little anal retentive. Ed watched with that same lazy golden-eyed stare as the man began to write on the page before him in large, neat print. In the top right corner of the empty page, he wrote today’s date. In the upper left, he wrote what Ed guessed was his name: _Roy Mustang_. 

It was the first time Ed had paid attention to what his tablemate had written on anything, and he had yet to hear the man speak, so naturally this was also the first time Ed had ever been able to put a name to the man’s handsome face. He held back a snort through pure willpower. What kind of name was “Roy Mustang?” He almost wanted to break his perpetual silence just to ask the man if it was his real name or not, but thought better of it. Not only was it needlessly confrontational when he was boxed in by the man’s — Roy’s — chair, but it would give away the fact that he was shamelessly reading over Roy’s shoulder to look at his notes. His mother had raised him better than that. Or at least, she had tried to, before her illness took her. 

Ed’s attention was again drawn away by the entrance of the course’s instructor, a balding bespectacled man in his late-fifties with an easygoing smile. He made a beeline for the computer at the center of the two projector screens and immediately logged in to begin pulling up the slides for the day’s lecture. Ed scratched in the date at the top of his notebook page, glancing out of the corner of his eye at Roy as the man adjusted his glasses and leaned forward slightly at the appearance of text on the projector screens. He diligently copied down the title of the day’s powerpoint presentation in that same large, neat handwriting. Ed wondered idly if it made more sense to take notes in a way that they could actually be read again later to study, as Roy did, or if his own chicken scratch was acceptable. He reminded himself that it wasn’t like he actually reviewed the notes for this class anyways, and decided that his own minimal-effort notetaking was fine for now. One day he would find a class that actually required effort (hah! Unlikely) and would have to correct his horrid penmanship. Today was not that day.

***

Tuesday evening found Ed back at Gamers, buying and selling used video games to local college students and anyone else who might wander in to idle in the warehouse-looking building in search of cheap entertainment. He spent the first hour and a half of his shift diligently re-stickering game boxes out on the floor to reflect the weekly price changes on some used Playstation games, and was just about done when the bell over the front door chimed and drew his attention to the first customer in almost half an hour.

“Hey, welcome to Gamers, can I help you with anything?” Ed asked the man who was struggling to prop open the heavy glass door with a large box in his arms. Ed helpfully pulled the door open for him, and when the man glanced up at him Ed’s heart skipped in his chest. He was without his usual glasses, and Ed had never seen him from head-on before so he couldn’t be sure, but the man in front of him appeared to be none other than his deskmate Roy Mustang.

“You buy used games and game systems here, correct?” Roy asked, eyes flickering between Ed’s face and the box in his arms. Ed was momentarily confused about the wariness in Roy’s eyes as he took in his surroundings, but his Customer Service Persona kicked in before he could stick his foot in his mouth.

“We do indeed,” Ed replied confidently, gesturing towards the nearest register perched atop a glass display case full of old Nintendo cartridges. “If you’d like to bring your items to that register, I can get you an appraisal on cash or trade-in values.” Roy obediently made his way to the register that Ed indicated and carefully deposited his items on the countertop as Ed made his way around behind it.

Ed pawed through the box for a moment, assessing what sort of things Roy had brought for him, and was met with a mixture of old games from the late 90s as well as a small collection of relatively new Xbox disks. 

“Are you an old-school gamer or a current-gen kind of guy?” Ed asked, partly by way of comment on Roy’s weird amalgamation of games and also to strike up a sales pitch; they needed to increase their sales numbers for the day if they were going to meet their sales goal.

“Um, neither really, anymore,” Roy answered cryptically. “This is mostly stuff from when I was a kid, and some stuff that an old ar—, an old friend gave to me that I couldn’t really get into.”

Ed inspected the Xbox disks quickly for scratches and spindle cracks, typing each title into his computer as he made a tidy stack on the other side of the register, the better to separate the inspected and the uninspected goods from each other. It seemed like mostly first-person shooters and action games; Call of Duty, Halo, Gears of War…

“Not much of an action fan, huh? I get it,” Ed commented. “I’m more of an RPG fan myself. Maybe we can find something that suits your tastes better; you get 10% extra if you do in-store credit instead of cash.” 

Roy glanced away, face impassive but stiffening shoulders giving away his discomfort. “I’d prefer cash if it’s all the same to you.”

“Absolutely,” Ed responded in his Customer Service Voice, mentally sidestepping that potential landmine. “Just wanted to make sure you were aware of your options, but we can certainly do cash.”

As Ed finished up testing the old Super Nintendo — it rattled with internal broken parts, and would have to be bought in as defective, but the controllers worked just fine once they were cleaned up a bit — and brought the final pieces back to the register, snapping a rubber band around a neatly wrapped power cable. He punched in the final items into the computer and scrolled to view the final total.

“If you want cash, we can give you $62.50 for it all,” Ed informed Roy. “If that’s acceptable, I would just need to see a government-issued ID, please.”

“Yes, that’s fine,” Roy responded, fishing a worn leather wallet out of the inside pocket of his jacket and passing his driver’s license across the counter. Ed took it and scanned the details as he entered them into the register. Roy Mustang, 26. Ed was momentarily surprised; he’d assumed Roy was an underclassmen like himself, but looks could be deceiving. He glanced up at Roy, pretending to match the license photo to the man in the flesh, but was secretly marveling at Roy’s baby face and taking a moment to confirm that the license was correct when it listed his eye color as blue. It was hard to tell, given the lighting, but if they really were blue, it was a very dark hue; they looked black to Ed. Another notation on the ID caught his attention: Roy was marked as visually impaired, requiring corrective lenses to drive. 

“It’s weird to see you without glasses,” Ed said before he could stop his mouth. Roy blinked in surprise and then squinted at Ed with an expression that the younger could only describe as _suspicious_. 

“Pardon me?” Roy asked hesitantly. Ed swallowed. So much for maintaining the professional Customer Service Persona.

“I’ve only ever seen you with your glasses on before,” Ed explained, blush warming his cheeks. “I wasn’t even entirely sure it was you when you first came in, you look so different.”

“I’m sorry, I’m afraid I don’t understand,” Roy responded, tone carefully even as his eyes somehow narrowed even further and he leaned slightly across the counter. “Have we met before?”

Irrational anger bubbled in Ed’s chest. Yeah, maybe they’d never spoken before, but they had been sitting together three days a week for three weeks now. Nine times they had sat within arm’s reach of each other, and Roy didn’t even recognize him? 

“You seriously don’t recognize me?” Ed growled. Roy’s mouth opened and closed several times, his eyebrows drawing together in confusion.

“I’m truly sorry, could you tell me how—”

“Nevermind, just forget about it,” Ed grumbled, embarrassment urging him to bring the awkward conversation to a close. If he had wanted to befriend his attractive deskmate before, any hope of that ever coming to pass had pitched itself head-first out the window now. “Please sign this receipt while I count out your total.” Roy hesitated, gaze flickering around helplessly, until Ed pushed a pen in his direction. Roy scribbled a messy scrawl across the bottom line and then held his hand out for the stack of bills Ed was brandishing at him like a knife. Ed counted the bills out loud as he thumbed them one by one into Roy’s palm, then turned to start gathering up the new merchandise that had once been Roy’s. 

“Thanks for your business, have a nice day,” Ed said frostily over his shoulder as he began carrying the games to the back to be cleaned and stickered. Roy hesitated by the register, expression distant and brows drawn, until he eventually shook his head resignedly and turned to leave the building. 

“Fuckin’ Mustang,” Ed growled.

***

Wednesday afternoon saw Ed once again waiting outside the doors of his English 170 class, swinging his right leg in front of himself as he waited for the doors to open and the stream of students from the previous class to clear out down the hall. When the coast was clear, he hoisted himself to his feet and made his way into the classroom, heading straight for his preferred seat at the far end of the first row. He scrolled idly through his phone for a while after he made himself comfortable, and just a few minutes before the class began, Roy appeared. Ed watched him in his peripherals, still a little pissed about the previous day and eager to find out what Mustang’s deal was.

The black-haired man dropped into his seat heavily, as if his legs had given out underneath him just as he reached the chair. He ran his hand through his bangs agitatedly, and Ed noticed that he was once again not wearing his glasses. Until the day before, he had never so much as taken them off briefly in class. Ed wondered if he had maybe gotten contacts or something.

The projector screens flickered to life with the day’s lecture slides, and Ed stuffed his phone into his pocket to copy down the slide title. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Roy squinting harshly and leaning forward in his seat, teeth worrying at his bottom lip. After a moment’s hesitation, he carefully copied down the slide title in the same large print as before, although Ed noticed now that the letters were floating haphazardly across the page, ignoring the light blue lines that most people would bother to adhere to when using lined paper to take notes. He shrugged internally; like he could judge, with his messy chicken scratch that barely stayed within the lines even when he tried to write neatly.

The professor began to speak, stopping briefly at his computer to advance the presentation to the next slide. Ed began to copy down the words, but paused when a raspy sound to his right drew his attention. He glanced sideways at Roy and startled at the sight of the man. His eyes were alternating between squinting aggressively at the screen and blinking rapidly, and the raspy sound seemed to be from the panicky breaths he was drawing in through his nose as he pressed his lips forcefully into a tight line. His hand trembled on his pen, hovering just over the page. He hadn’t written a single word of the new slide.

“Hey, man,” Ed murmured. Roy froze, frantic eyes darting towards his blond neighbor. “Everything okay?” Roy’s eyes squeezed shut and he sucked in a slow, deep breath, schooling his features into something polite and neutral before responding. His hands were still shaking.

“I’m sorry for distracting you,” Roy whispered back. “I broke my glasses on Monday and apparently my vision is worse than I thought. I’d be incredibly grateful if you’d let me copy your notes, just for today.” 

Ed’s heart sank in his chest. If Roy’s vision was bad enough that he couldn’t see the magnified font on the projector screen ten feet in front of them, then suddenly a lot of things made sense. A flicker of guilt tightened his throat as it occurred to him that Roy probably couldn’t even see his face the day before at the game store; recognizing him would have been impossible since they didn’t know each other’s voices.

For a moment, Ed didn’t see Roy in front of him. He saw himself, fresh from the car accident and before he’d gone through physical therapy and gotten his prosthetic, unable to walk to the bathroom on his own or write with his right hand any longer. He saw Al, when his autoimmune disease sent him to the hospital and his weak, shaking hands weren’t strong enough to bring a cup of water to his mouth and someone else had to feed him. He saw his mother, shortly before that same disease took her from him and a nurse had to help her edit her will so that everything went to her sons instead of her good for nothing husband. He saw someone who couldn’t manage on their own, and whose dignity was failing them. At least this time around he knew he could help.

“Yeah, sure, ‘s no problem,” Ed replied a little belatedly. “Do you want me to just send you pictures of them after class? That way you can just listen to the lecture for now. I can email them or text them to you or somethin’.” Roy’s face softened immediately with relief.

“I would greatly appreciate that,” he breathed. “My name is Roy.”

“I, uh, I know,” Ed muttered. “I was the guy at the game store yesterday. Sorry for bein’ such an ass; I didn’t realize you couldn’t recognize me without your glasses. I’m Ed.” Roy stifled a hysterical giggle behind the back of his knuckles, grin crinkling the corner of his eyes.

“I was wondering if that was you. I’ve never heard you talk though, and I’ve never seen you standing so I had no idea you were so short.”

“ _Who the hell are you callin—_ ”

“Mr. Elric,” the professor interrupted, approaching his table. Ed wilted and tried to hide himself under the desk. “Please refrain from having side conversations while my lecture is in progress, hmm?”

“Sorry,” Ed muttered, face darkening. Roy snickered silently, scribbling his phone number and email address on a sheet of notebook paper and sliding it towards Ed. Ed shot him a glare that went unnoticed by Roy’s inability to even perceive that Ed currently possessed facial features. Ed punched Roy’s information into his phone and cheerfully labeled the contact “Bastard.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> drag show drag show

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi i'm posting this without proofreading bc i'm too lazy lol sowwy

Ed (9:43): hey this is ed

Ed (9:43): sorry for the delay but heres the english notes

Ed (9:44): [notes.pdf 45.6kb]

Bastard (9:46): Thank you, Ed. I really appreciate you taking the time to send these to me.

Ed (9:47): no problem

Ed (9:47): how is your glasses situation

Ed (9:47): did you order another pair already

Bastard (9:50): Yes, I was able to get in to see my optometrist this afternoon after classes. I should be picking up my replacements on Friday. I’m afraid that may mean that I’ll miss class again, if you wouldn’t mind sharing your notes again in that event.

Ed (9:51): sure i can do that

Ed (9:52): even if you can make it to class, if you dont have your glasses yet i can def share my notes with you again

Bastard (9:53): That’s very kind of you, Ed. Thank you.

Ed (9:54): you dont have to keep thankin me, its really no problem

Ed (9:54): gives me a reason to make my notes presentable lol

Bastard (9:56): I hope you didn’t make them presentable just for my sake! Don’t you reread your notes to study? Or are you one of those people whose handwriting can only be read by themself?

Ed (9:57): trust me. if i didnt work extra hard to make them readable you wouldnt even know what language they were in lol

Bastard (9:58): In that case, I’m grateful you made them nice for me. My screen reader thanks you, too.

Ed (9:59): what did i say about thankin me

Bastard (10:00): Thank you for the reminder ;)

Ed (10:01): are you always such a shithead

Bastard (10:02): Haha! Only about 85% of the time.

Bastard (10:05): This file is all typed, but I could swear you take your notes on paper in class. Did you type this up just for me?

Ed (10:06): like i said you wouldnt be able to read them if i hand wrote them for you

Bastard (10:08): … Thank you for taking so much extra effort on my account ;p

Ed (10:09): im blocking your number mustang jfc

***

“What are you doing tomorrow night?” 

“Huhwhat?” Ed replied intelligently, looking up from the homework assignment he had been working on on his laptop. Winry stood in the doorway, holding a flier up in front of her towards Ed. Ed flapped his hand in her direction, making a grabby motion with his fingers, and Winry crossed the floor to hand it to him. 

_ Amateur Drag Night _ was emblazoned across the flier in large, gaudy font at a jaunty angle. There were pictures of drag queens in elaborate makeup and fancy lingerie-slash-dresses layered around the background like cutouts from a magazine made into a collage. At the bottom, in a clean, readable script, was an address of a bar called  _ Madame Christmas _ and a date: this Friday night, beginning at 9:00 pm. 

“This sounds like a dysphoria nightmare,” Ed responded, grimacing. He had gotten a lot more comfortable with breaking gender norms as he had gotten older and gotten further into his transition, but wearing makeup or feminine clothing could easily trigger his body dysphoria. 

“I’m not suggesting  _ you _ be a drag queen,” Winry clarified, tugging sharply on Ed’s bangs in reprimand for jumping to conclusions. “I was wondering if you wanted to go watch. The event is open to anyone eighteen and up, so we can get in and watch even though it’s a bar.” At Ed’s skeptical expression, she pressed, “Come on, Ed! I know you don’t have hardly any LGBT friends, don’t you want to experience your culture?”

“My ‘culture’?” Ed sneered. “I’m not exactly the posterchild for queer society, Win.”

“I know, but that’s also part of what I mean,” Winry continued. “You’re isolated from other LGBT people, and I think it would be beneficial to get to know others like you. Broaden your horizons and get in touch with the subculture that paved the way for your rights, you know?

“You mean like Stonewall and stuff?”

“Yeah, exactly,” Winry said. “Without drag queens and trans women, LGBT rights in the US would be so far behind.”

“How do you even know about all this stuff?” Ed questioned.

“I’m taking a Queer Studies course this semester and it’s really eye-opening. Anyways, getting back to the issue: are you free tomorrow or not? This could be really fun, and maybe you’ll meet some cool LGBT folks you can be friends with. Who knows, you could even find yourself a hottie,” Winry purred, waggling her eyebrows. Ed buried his face in his hands and moaned. 

“I guess I’m free, although I don’t know that I’d have chosen to go if you weren’t bullyin’ me into it,” Ed groaned into his palms.

“Quit being such a downer, Ed,” Winry chastised him, smacking the flier down on the top of Ed’s head. “It’ll be fun! Some of the other students in my Queer Studies class are going, too, so it’ll be a party.”

“Great,” Ed sighed.

***

“Great,” Ed deadpanned. Winry frowned at him in the mirror.

“You’ve said that about the last, like, six outfits,” she complained.

“Uh, correction: the last one was ‘fine,’ the one before that was ‘sure,’ before that was ‘okay, and—”

“Yeah yeah yeah, whatever. What’s wrong with this one?”

“There’s nothing  _ wrong _ with it,” Ed said. “I don’t really care what I wear tonight, Win. I’d be fine in just regular street clothes, really.” Winry pouted.

“I want us to get all dressed up since we’re going out on the town!”

“What is this, the forties? Who even says that any more?”

“Shut up, Ed!”

“I’m surprised you two are still here,” Al interrupted from the doorway. Winry paused in the middle of wrestling Ed’s shirt — a white button-up patterned with various cacti and succulents with a salmon-colored breast pocket that she thought emphasized his broad shoulders and trim waist quite nicely, thank you very much — over his head.

“Ed won’t cooperate,” she tattled. Ed yelped complaints from within the confines of his desert-themed head-prison.

“It’s almost 8:30,” Al warned her, ignoring the wardrobe debacle before him. “If you want to walk to the bar and get in before the show starts, you need to leave soon.”

“What do you know, Al?” Ed grumbled, one golden eye glaring over the bottom hem of the shirt from where it was firmly wedged around his shoulders. “You’d better not be going out to bars without letting me know. You’re only nineteen anyways, they shouldn’t be letting you in! And besides, if something happened to you and I didn’t know where you were—”

“Relax, Brother,” Al soothed. “I promise I haven’t been going out to bars in secret. I know better than to leave my emergency contact in the dark.” The lower half of his face was stoic, but a grin tightened his eyes teasingly.

“You heard the man,” Winry said, changing the topic before Ed could fully spiral into an overprotective brotherly episode, swatting Ed across the behind with the newly-freed shirt. “We’re running out of time. Pick something and put it on and let’s  _ go! _ ”

***

The thumping bass from the club music playing inside  _ Madame Christmas _ spilled out through the open front door as Ed and Winry approached the bar. Winry was already bobbing her head in time with the beat as she scanned the small crowd outside the bar for her friends.

“I don’t see them; they must be inside already,” she informed Ed as they approached the front door. He shrugged; he hadn’t really been interested in the idea of Winry’s friends joining them, and didn’t intend to spend too much time getting to know them either. He had been marinating on the thought of music, possibly food, and an interesting show for the past 24-ish hours and was primarily interested in those three things. Anything else was just extra.

The bouncer at the door checked their IDs and accepted their cover charge, then fastened a fluorescent orange wristband to each of their right wrists before allowing them inside. Ed examined his wristband as Winry led the way in. In large black print were the words “MINOR” repeated all the way around the band. Having never been inside a bar before, Ed could only hope that the bartender would still be willing to sell them non-alcoholic beverages with the neon “look at me I’m underaged” beacons attached to their persons.

Ed glanced up when Winry stopped in front of him, and realized she had brought him to the bar. There were a number of people already milling about waiting for drinks, and Ed’s view of the actual bar was completely obstructed by heads and shoulders. He bounced up onto his tiptoes in an effort to see if a real bar looked the way they did on TV, but only managed to get a better view of the brick wall near the ceiling. He frowned and resigned himself to clinging to Winry as she slowly edged her way forward through the thinning wall of bodies.

“What do you want, Ed?” Winry shouted over the music. Ed shrugged helplessly; what would they even serve him? Water? He was out of his depth here. Winry shrugged in return and turned to speak to, Ed assumed, the bartender who had turned to take her order.

“Can I have an Arnold Palmer, please?” Winry shouted to the bartender. Ed fidgeted behind her for a moment until a glass appeared in front of her; Winry picked up the glass, held it artfully above her head, and used her free hand to shove Ed forward to the bar’s edge. He caught himself on the counter top and his eyes darted around, taking in the view in front of him for the first time. Countless bottles in different colors, shapes, and sizes lined the wall, and metal taps and what looked like a soda fountain took up a sizable amount of the counter directly in front of Ed. His frantic eyes didn’t recognize a single thing. Shit.

“What can I get for you?” the tall, heavy-set bartender asked Ed, her low voice cutting straight through the music. Ed’s eyes nervously darted to her nametag, which read  _ Aunt Chris _ . Ed shrugged awkwardly and held up his right hand, displaying the wristband. She seemed to understand and asked, “First time?” Ed nodded, his tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth. “What do you normally like, hon? We have juice and soda of all kinds.”

“Do you have orange juice?” Ed managed. The woman nodded and offered him a tight smile, tapping her long, painted nails on the bar top.

“It’ll be three dollars. I’ll be just a second.”

Ed withdrew his wad of ones from his pocket, suddenly grateful Winry had insisted on it at the ATM. He counted out three bills and set them on the counter, and by the time he was tucking the rest back into his high-waisted jeans the bartender had already placed a glass of orange juice in front of him.

“Thank you,” Ed said politely, his voice drowned out by the thumping bass. The bartender gave him another tight smile and then turned expectantly to the next customer. Ed took that as his cue to leave and turned to push his way through the crowd after Winry, orange juice in tow.

“Ed!” Winry’s familiar voice called over the noise. Ed’s head whipped around and he spotted her surrounded by a group of flamboyantly-dressed college kids that he assumed were her classmates. He waded through the crowd, dodging elbows of people headed for the bar, and squeezed himself into the group and against Winry’s side. She draped her arm around his shoulders and gestured in the air with the other hand holding her drink, continuing a story that had obviously began before Ed arrived.

“And then I was like, are you freaking  _ kidding _ me?” she shouted to the three people who were looking her way; the rest of the group were chattering amongst themselves as well. “I bought that textbook, like, two days before, and they wouldn’t accept a refund and would only give me trade in values. Guess how much they were offering for trade in.”

“Fifteen dollars,” a man with a scruffy goatee and over-drawn black cat-eye eyeliner suggested. The girl next to him, whose hair was buzzed all the way down to her scalp, shook her head and patted the man on the cheek somewhat aggressively. “No way the bookstore is handing over more than twelve-fifty.”

“Close,” Winry said, pointing at the girl with one of the precious few fingers still clutching her glass. “Eleven-ninety-nine. Un-freaking-believable! I paid almost two hundred dollars for that textbook, and it wasn’t even opened! It was still in the shrink wrap!”

“It’s not impossible to open something and re-shrink wrap it,” Ed offered, trying to raise his voice enough to be heard. “We have a shrink wrap machine at Gamers, and if you know what you’re doin’, you can make it look pretty professional.”

“It had the original bookstore stickers and everything on the shrink wrap though,” Winry argued, sloshing a little of her drink over the edge of her glass. It occurred to Ed that he could smell alcohol from much closer than just the general atmosphere; how had Winry even gotten alcohol? The man with the goatee withdrew a flask from the inside pocket of his coat and took a swig, and Ed understood with a grimace. He wondered briefly how well Winry really knew these people outside of her Queer Studies class, and if it was a good idea to be hanging out with them at a potentially unsafe place like a bar.

“You could probably peel those off and reapply them if you’re really that desperate for the full refund price,” the girl with the shaved head said with a shrug. “I wouldn’t doubt they’ve seen that sort of thing before.”

Ed zoned out of the conversation, turning to look around the crowded bar now that his proximity to Winry was helping to calm his nervous energy about being in a new situation. The room they were in was narrow and ran the length of the bar, with only two doors at either end of the long room. One door was the entrance to the building through which they had entered; the other led into a room that looked just as packed from Ed’s low vantage point, but looked significantly larger. He assumed that was the dance floor where the drag show would be held. He fished his phone out of his pocket with his free hand to check the time: twelve minutes until the show would begin. He tucked it back into his pocket, glancing around at his current company with increasing distaste as the man with the goatee offered his flask to the shaved-headed girl and then the clearly underaged Winry.

“I’m going to go find a place to watch the show,” Ed said into Winry’s ear. “Be careful, okay? I know you can make your own choices an’ all, but be safe. Please.”

“I’ll be fine, you worry too much,” Winry assured Ed. Ed was not assured. “I’ll catch up with you later, okay?” she added as he slipped out from under her arm and disappeared into the crowd with a wave over his shoulder.

The larger dance room was beginning to fill up with patrons as the clock ticked ever nearer to nine o'clock. Tall tables scattered around the room were being claimed to perch drinks and purses and phones on top of, and Ed hurried to claim one of the remaining empty tables before he had to resign himself to standing against a wall. He set down his orange juice and leaned his elbows on the small table, his shoulders hunching up from the abnormally tall height of the tabletop. His eyes started to scan the room from his vantage point curiously.

A short stage, about three feet tall, was situated at the far back wall of the room. The wall behind it was covered in lights, and a screen off to the side was cycling through advertisements for upcoming events at Madame Christmas, a specialty drink menu, and an itinerary for the night’s entertainment. A curtained-over door to the left of the stage seemed to be where the performers would enter from, and the temporarily-erected catwalk extending from the stage out into the room would bring those same performers within just a few feet of Ed. Easy access to hold out a dollar for them to claim.

A member of the waitstaff was making a round of the room, picking up discarded bottles of beer and empty glasses. As he drew near, Ed got a better glimpse of his face under the purple lights of the room, and a shock lit through him as he realized he did actually know someone here besides Winry. Ed’s arm darted out almost before he’d even acknowledged that he recognized the man, his fingers snatching onto his shoulder and halting his circuit of the room.

“Roy!” Ed called over the music. Roy’s eyes snapped to his in surprise. Ed, recalling Roy’s poor vision and noting his lack of glasses, leaned in close so hopefully Roy could see his face enough to recognize him. “It’s Ed.”

“Yes, I know; hello, Edward,” Roy replied with a chuckle. 

“Huh?” Ed responded intelligently.

“I have contacts in,” Roy said, gesturing at his eyes. “The optometrist gave me a prescription for those, too, since I didn’t have one yet.” Ed’s face warmed up as he realized then that their too-close-for-platonic-acquaintances pose was entirely unnecessary. He leaned back, placing one elbow on his table in what he hoped was a casual movement.

“Oh, cool. So do you work here then?”

“Yes, sometimes. My aunt Chris owns the bar.” Ed’s thoughts flickered to the bartender with the now too-appropriate nametag. “I’m just helping clean up things for a bit before the show, though.”

“Just before the show?” Ed asked in surprise. “Do they not need your help for the rest of the night?” Roy shrugged.

“They might, but I want to watch the show tonight. It’s been awhile since I’ve been able to attend an event here as just a member of the crowd.”

“You can watch with me if you want,” Ed offered, gesturing towards his empty table. “My roommate came with me, but she’s fucked off with some classmates at the moment so I dunno if she’s gonna come back or not so the spot’s free.”

“I’ll take you up on that offer, then, if it’s truly alright,” Roy said with a grin. “Let me just drop these off in the back and get cleaned up and then I’ll come back out.”

“Sounds good,” Ed agreed with a thumbs up, watching as Roy retreated from the room. Maybe tonight wouldn’t be so bad after all. 


End file.
